What to say? Well, I finished the book, I guess that's something. Vittorio is not a vampire until about 30 pages from the end, so if you're wanting a vampire story, this is not it. It was kind of boring, not a whole lot of engaging plot. I don't know, I'm apparently just not a fan of Anne Rice's writing.

All in all, if you're OCD about reading an entire series or author, then by all means read this. I, however, would recommend to skip this one. Vittorio has no ties to any other vampire story, so it truly is a stand-alone story. This was an okay book, but definitely not the best I've ever read. Continue at your own risk. ( )

”Cuando era niño tuve una espantosa pesadilla. Soñé que sostenía en mis brazos las cabezas cortadas de mi hermano y hermana menores. Estaban inmóviles, mudos; los ojos abiertos no dejaban de pestañear, las mejillas teñidas de rojo. Yo estaba tan horrorizada que me quedé mudo como ellos, incapaz de articular palabra. El sueño se hizo realidad.
Pero nadie llorará por mí ni por ellos. Mis hermanos han sido enterrados en una fosa anónima, bajo el peso de cinco siglos.
Soy un vampiro. Me llamo Vittorio y escribo este relato en la torre más alta del castillo en ruinas donde nací...”

hb

Anne Rice has stated she wants book reviewers to be required to post with their full, real name. In response, I am removing all my reviews of her novels as I am unable and unwilling to do this. I am no longer comfortable reading or reviewing her work. Thank you.

VITTORIO THE VAMPIRE could be described as Anne Rice light, but for me that is not a necessarily a bad thing. After reading the saga of the Mayfair Witches, and the follow up, MERRICK, where she crosses over the Mayfairs with the Vampire Chronicles, I was in the mood for something different, and in this slight – 284 pages in my paperback – book she delivers. Written at the end of the ‘90s, VITTORIO THE VAMPIRE is exactly what the title implies: a vampire’s story. It is subtitled The New Tales of the Vampire as a way to set it apart from The Chronicles, which is fair, as Lestat and his crew from The Big Easy are referred to once, and make no appearances here. It seems that at this point, Rice had run out of stories to tell with Lestat; I remember hearing her say in an interview that she literally saw him walk away in her imagination, and that she was finished with the character (though he would return years later).

But clearly she was not finished with the creatures of the night. Told in the first person, we meet Vittorio on the first page, and he proceeds to recount how he came to receive the Dark Gift. Born to a noble family in the country side of Renaissance Italy, he is one of those incredibly handsome youths Rice loves to describe in detail. And put through hell, which occurs when young Vittorio’s family is massacred in the night by an army of “demons” who stalk the countryside, demanding a payment in flesh from the nobility and commoners alike in order to be left in peace. Of course these monsters turn out to be vampires, and only Vittorio survives because one their number, a female, takes yen to him. The young man vows revenge, and sets out to make it happen, but it is a journey which takes some interesting twists and turns. A journey that includes a prosperous town with no sick, feeble, beggars, or criminals; the Court of the Ruby Grail, where scores of vampires worship Lucifer, and feed upon captive humans kept in a “coop;” Renaissance Florence, where guardian angels walk the streets, and do their best to keep foolish mortals, including Fra Filippo Lippi, an artist whose work Vittorio particularly admires, from their worst instincts. Along the way, Vittorio encounters the vampire Lord Florian, whose offer of immortality he contemptuously rejects; the armor wearing angel Mastrema, who ultimately aides him in his quest for vengeance; and Ursula, the centuries old vampire child bride. It is love at first sight for Vittorio and Ursula, and his weakness for her proves to be his undoing.

A lot of Rice fans gave this book a negative review; especially when it was first published. It seems they wanted more Lestat, and Louis, and Armand, and the Talemasca, and would settle for nothing less. But I enjoyed it if for no other reason than that she reigned in her penchant for long passages of prose stuffed with adjectives and minute details, though she did her homework when it came to Renaissance Italy, and imparts plenty of knowledge on the reader – it never overwhelms the story. There are also no flashbacks within flashbacks that have become a Rice trope, as at no point in the book do two characters sit down and have a very long conversation where one goes on for 500 pages regaling the other with back story. In her depiction of the town of Santa Maddalana, Rice is saying something about prosperity and the price those deemed of no value pay for it. This book is also blessedly free of the kinky or off putting sexual elements that too often turned up in the Mayfair books. I thought her depictions of the Court of the Ruby Grail, and the cavorting vampires there to be some of Rice’s best work; so too the sections where Vittorio returns there to get his revenge. And in Vittorio and Ursula, Rice has created two of her more likable lead characters.

The best compliment I could pay VITTORIO THE VAMPIRE is that it could have been the basis for a great film directed by Mario Bava. Sadly, he was long dead by the time this book was published, but if anyone does not understand, or doubt what I am talking about, check out Bava’s classic Italian horror films, BLACK SUNDAY and BLACK SABBATH, and you’ll see what I mean. It is my hope that if we ever get that TV adaptation of The Vampire Chronicles, then we’ll get to see Vittorio and Urusla. ( )